Am scris asta mai demult, dar l-am lăsat pe ”hold” zilele ăstea.
Aș fi putut să includ asta ca poveste în poveste aici. Dar era deja destul de lung, iar eu am scriu deja destul de confuz si, indiferent de ce-ați crede, nu lucrez pentru big pharma, nici nu mă plătesc producătorii de pastile de dureri de cap.
Mă aflam în taxiul care venise să mă ducă de la autogara Park and Ride la Luton. Mă dezmorțeam așezat confortabil în Mercedesul E-Klasse condus de un nene de origine indiană, pakistaneză, sau oricestaneză. Eu nu prea îi deosebesc .
Inevitabil, mă întreabă de unde sunt și unde mă duc. Nu m-a întrebat al cui sunt. I-am răspuns și s-a grăbit să se entuziasmeze și să-mi spună că are câțiva români clienți fideli și chiar în ziua aia luase pe cineva de la Luton. Nu mă afectează emoțional sau cognitiv genul ăsta de povești spuse de taximetriști. Le iau ca pe texte de familiarizare, să-mi inducă mie faptul că e familiar cu ăștia ca mine, am citit pe undeva că ar fi o tactică psihologică.
Așa că bâgui ceva în semn de aprobare politicoasă a activității lui de transport români, cât mai succint și cât mai închis la continuarea unei discuții pe temă. Dar nu e după mine.
Cumva, nu îmi aduc aminte în detaliu cum, că încă nu mi se dezghețase partea creierului responsabilă cu memorara conversațiilor inutile, omul aduce în discuție textul ”Am auzit că acolo în România sunt oameni care fac vrăji.”
M-am întristat brusc, pentru că dacă afirmația asta nu e o glumă, sau un test pentru a vedea cât de prost sunt eu, discuția nu are cum să continue fericit. Sau, mă rog, nu sunt eu atât de inteligent și răbdător să pot imagina un dialog și o inerentă dezbatere, nu neapărat cu ”happy end”, dar care să nu îmi lase un sentiment de aer greu respirabil.
Încerc să o dreg cu o glumiță și-l întreb râzând fals :
-Oh, you have read that book written by Bram Stoker, haven’t you?
Proastă idee, că omul nu prea părea că ar fi citit prea multe, de ce dracului să fi citit tocmai aia, dar zic să nu judec oamenii după aparențe.
-No. What book?
-Uh, Dracula. Then you are maybe inspired by all these movies with vampires and Dracula from Transylvania? You know, they’re just movies. Fantasies.
-No, no! Not movies! I know the movies, but it’s not about them. These people that I am taking from the airport, they are all talking about dark magic happening in your country.
Știam deja despre ce vorbește și am să descriu aici pe scurt o poveste despre ”magia neagră”, pentru care tata probabil se va supăra pe mine, când îi voi da linkul de la blogul meu, cât și de la altele, să citească, că oricum se uită numai la Mizerii TV.
Știam precis despre ce vorbește, doar că mă încărca un sentiment de greutate să mă trezesc, brusc, din taxiul în drum spre Luton într-o scenă din Diablo, sau Warcraft, sau alte jocuri cu spell points și mana.
Cu un ultim efort îi spun că:
-There is, really, no black magic, only naive people believing in such lies and professional scammers making a living out of it. And yes, sadly, you can still see such medieval practices of scamming people in Romania and I am not proud even to mention them, but I am sure you can see these tricks beyond the people’s words and their unjustified fears, while you look at them as a man living in a modern and educated country.
Pârț! Îi spun eu asta unui taximetrist. Probabil, ca și Dragnea, îl confundam cu un specialist IT. Aici l-am pierdut și a preluat controlul discuției și are rost să continui să spun povestea doar ca să evidențiez două lucruri:
- Medievalismul în care România încă se scaldă.
2.Infuzia de medievalism adusă în occident de migranți, fie că-s români din ”The Village”, fie că-s pakiși închiși și captivi în coranul lor (wait for it!).
Și începe:
-No, these people, they were quite affected and seem to be honest, they described how these things happen!
-Well, honest in their beliefs they may be, and affected as well, specially if they’ve lost some money and they have a personal issue that pushed them to these primitive beliefs, but that doesn’t have anything to do with the reality.
-No, they said to me that there, in Romania, there are old women that can turn some person’s life bad, they can curse you, they can put spells on you, they use blood, animals and cards, too see and turn the future into better or worse. They do incantations.
-Cards! If they would only use books! But, yes. They do. They do, indeed, all these and more, but that doesn’t mean they actually change the future, or cast spells effectively. The only people who are caught under their spell are those seeking their council and help, because they’re extorted of money and other values. These incantations are not for free. And they’re also blackmailed to push more and more money into it and, while their life doesn’t turn the way they want, they get more and more anxious, depressed, and make themselves believe that there is actually some outcome of this fake sorcery.
-So, you do not believe in black magic?!
-Well, I am sorry to disappoint you you, but I don’t. If you hoped that maybe I have too some nice and spicy stories about this, I am afraid I have not.
Speram să pot, astfel, încheia subit discuția despre vrăjitoreală, dar m-a dat perversa de pe Târgu Ocna, ca să zic așa:
-So, you have never been affected until now by the black magic in your country?
Aș fi putut Ar fi trebuit să îi spun, sec, că nu! Ca s-o închei aici. Dar trebuia să fac eu pe intelectualul pulii și pe moralistul și i-am dat jocul:
Ar trebui să continui în românește, că pentru români scriu asta, dar nu. Am motivele mele. Cine vrea să înțeleagă, să traducă, dacă nu știe.
-I was affected profoundly by the practice of ”black magic” in my country. But not because of any magic happening, but as a result of the stupidity of all the people surrounding themselves with it.
-Oh , interesting, sir! Please, continue!
-When I was a kid , the people of my country were even more stupid than they are now, if you can imagine. And now you hear from UK that they are still scared of BM. I almost laugh. They were much more stupid and more poor . And these two things were a great issue for forming new and independent families that could eventually grow smarter and get over these unproven lies. They relied and depended heavily on their parents and they couldn’t escape from that.
-I don’t understand you! Why to escape from parents?
-When you would marry you could not move out from your parents house and influence, because you would not have a house of your own. Well, the woman would move out, but you would end up living with either your in-laws or your parents. Or even if you would get to live in your own house, it would be more or less provided by your parents or in-laws. So they would have some control over your family, that they wouldn’t refrain to express.
-Naturally, but what does this has to do with black magic?
-Well, think about the fact that my father’s mom didn’t like my mother at all, while my mother’s mom didn’t like my father at all. Things which caused lots of tensions over the years. Most of them from my father’s mom, as we were living in the same village in the house built by my father’s parents.
-It happens.
-More likely to happen if you’re stupid and poor.
-And the black magic ?
-Well, when my grandmother, the mother of my father, passed away our family was about to become free and I had, without realizing, the happiest day of my childhood. As you may expect, the other mother in law came to the funeral. She would still hate my father, but had less to say since her daughter was not living in her reach, nor we were depending on her in any way.
-So then what? Did she do any black magic on your father?
-Well, as far as it concerns them, she did some incantations, supposedly to make my father die, or something . I don’t recall her exact goal with it, as it was stupid anyway!
-And what happened? Did the curse fell on your father?
-Not really. More like on my mother.
-Well, you know, the spells are not going always the way you expect. What happened?
-It happened that my father caught her in the process of doing all these things. And he got irritated.
-See? Your father did believe in it! Of course he was irritated, anyone would have gotten mad!
-Well, I didn’t say that my father was a smart man!
-Shame on you, then! How can you talk like that about your father?
-And he wasn’t convinced of all this black magic stuff, though he admits that he had some fears of his own. But the point is that he caught his mother in-law trying to harm him. It doesn’t matter what were the means and whether they work, or not.
-Indeed. And what did he do?
-He banished his mother in law from his house, he never forgave her while she was alive, he never visited her before she died and we were free of any contact or influence from her ever since. So we could have at last a close to normal family life.
-Well, but this was for the best, I see. How did this affect you?
-Well, for starters, I had 2 grand parents from that lineage. The other one was actually great, but I didn’t got to see him, neither my mother didn’t get to see her parents since, for a very long time.
-Oh I see. So that’s why you don’t believe in black magic?
-No. But because there are no proven effects of it.
-So, you don’t believe in God?
-I don’t know how come that you ask me this, but no. I don’t.
Și a început musulmanul.
-Because if there is evil there must also be God.
Dualism. Îi răspund:
-I choose to believe that there’s only humans in evil or good.
-But, what if it’s real and you just ignore his presence?
Ajungem într-un punct în care îi explic că, principial vorbind, eu nu am o problemă dacă Dumnezeu există, dar că dacă el există, deși mie nu-mi pasă, nu poate fi vorba să fie Dumnezeul descris în carțile oricărei religii, pentru că ălea au fost scrise toate de oameni. Oameni care au ca interes prostirea altor oameni. Ce mi-o fi trecut prin cap sa spun asta, nu știu. La care zice:
-That is right. I am here with you. All the religion books were written by people and they are all wrong. Except one!
Normal, în pula mea, că ”except one”. Adică aia a lui.
-Why, is there any book that has not been written by people?
-Yes, the Quran!
-Who wrote that?
-God himself!
-Really, God himself has written the book?
-Yes!
-And there is any proof that supports this theory?
-It is not a theory, it is how it has happened and the proof is that all the versions of Quran that you may find in any language and written in any time, they are all the same. Nothing has changed . While in other books it has.
-So, in your opinion, if something is unchanged from the beginning it’s a proof that it has been written by God, or Allah, and that it’s the pure truth.
-Yes, all the other books have changed.
-So the key to the truth and to God would be to repeat the same thing over and over , even if it’s a lie, even if it has gaps in the logic.
-No! But the fact that it has been the same all this time is the proof that it’s written by God. And that it’s true.
-So, if I tell you one lie for 1000 years and I stand behind it, I don’t change any word of it, will it become true and would value as much as the word from God?
-But this is not how it happened.
-And yet, we rely only on the fact that nothing has been changed from the original version, as you say.
-Have you read the Quran?
…Oh, nu…
-I have started, but I… I can’t finish it, because it does not make much sense for me. It’s sound like a nice story rather than as verifiable collection of facts.
-No, but please, read it and you can make your own mind afterwards. I am an open person and I can take other opinions.
-Ok. I will read it .
-So, then you will see the truth!
-We’ll speak afterwards. I have to read it first.
-Yes, but I tell you, there is nothing else alike it!
-I have to read it first, right ?
-Right.
Si-atunci il intreb eu:
-But do you believe in ghosts and black magic, like those happening in Romania? Do you think such things can possibly exist?
-Yes! I do believe that.
-Why? Is it written in Quran?
-Yes. Quran condemns the black magic! These are the evil ways.
-Interesting. Where are you from ?
-Pakistan.
Așa e. Coranul condamnă magia neagră ( lol). Și tot ce încerca omul să-mi spună voalat e că vin dintr-o țară de infideli spurcați.
Și așa e. La fel de înapoiați ca și ăia din Pakistanul din care vine el, doar că în alt fel ”mai spurcat”.
Oh , mulțumesc. Era păcat să plătesc 90 de lire doar pentru un drum pe al cărui mers să nu fi învățat nimic. Să nu știu că ca la aproape 800 de ani după ce un englez si-a imaginat intr-un mod primitiv Big Bangul, la mai bine de 50 de ani de când alt englez a început să ne explice cam cum funcționează lucrurile care n-au fost cuprinse de Einstein și colaboratorii în teoria lui și la vreun an de când și cocalarii au aflat ce-s ălea undele gravitaționale ( nu pot să nu pun melodia asta din nou) – românii nu se lasă, ei tot cu globul și cu vrăjeala o ard.
Cam la același nivel cu pakistanezii suntem. Nu cu Pakistanul. Sunt un pic mai departe decât noi.
